Mark Bonner said his side have benefitted from a full week of training ahead of their clash with Yeovil Town.

The U’s interim head coach had just two days to prepare the time for their Checkatrade Trophy clash against Northampton, before having to make the long journey up to Tranmere last weekend.

But ahead of Saturday’s crunch match with their fellow League Two strugglers, Bonner said he has been pleased with the players’ application.

“It’s been good.” he said. “Obviously last week we had two games and with the travel day on Friday we only had two days on the grass.

“Both days were match preparation for a game, so to be able to have a full week this week and get some good work into the players has been excellent.

“It’s been our first full training week for a while with the few midweek games we’ve had in recent weeks.

“It’s allowed us to spend a little bit more times embedding some principles and looking at a few different shapes and ways of playing that we haven’t been able to do in the previous week.

“Monday to Friday is excellent,” he said. “It’s what coaches love, being on the grass with players and trying to influence them and create an environment and culture which gets the best out of people firstly.

“Secondly, I have been designing training sessions that are challenging but linked to how we want to play the game.

“That’s what coaches enjoy doing, so having that process to improve the team and improve the players is something I’ll always enjoy doing.”

“Between us, it’s been a good week and the players have worked really hard and we’ve been pleased with the outcomes and how they’ve done and the proof will be in the pudding on Saturday.”

And, while saying there’s room for improvement, particularly going forward, Bonner believes that there is potential in the formation that he’s implemented.

He said that United will have to be flexible as they head into a run of crucial games in League Two.

“There’s definitely some plus points from a defensive point of view and attacking point of view in the system,” he said.

“I think the thing we’ve tried to get across in the short space of time that I’ve been doing this is: some of the principles in attack and defence will be the same, but our shape needs to be a little bit more flexible.

He continued: “I wouldn’t want to say that’s (the 4-4-1-1) our fixed shape or how that’s going to play in every game or that we can’t change shape within a game because we have got players that can be flexible and change position.

“I think this season we have seen that from the start of games and in games we’ve made shape changes.”